The Reflex Gun Part 1

The Reflex Gun Part 1

The Argo is approaching Pluto, where Colonel Gantz gets impatient.  He muses on the power of the wave motion gun.  They, however, have a reflex gun, which is more powerful that the wave motion gun, but with shorter range.

The Argo is being tracked by a stealthy Gamilon spy satellite.  On the bridge, Venture has the class to bring up the death of Derek's brother near Pluto.

The Gamilon squads lift off.  Gantz launches a missile barrage to provide additional incentive.  They've also fired 20 planet bombs at Earth today.  Nova detects the planet bombs on the radar, and they surmise that there's a base on Pluto.  Avatar reminds them that the mission to to get the Cosmo DNA, but the Pluto base is likewise important.  They launch fighters.

Gantz sees the Star Force deploy and gloats.  The superior numbers of Gamilon fighters swarms out into space. 

Avatar has his department heads looking at the map of Pluto, and Venture eggs Wildstar on.  Avatar refuses to use the wave motion gun for fear of destroying all life on . . . Pluto.  Nova detects teh Gamilon fighters on radar.  Avatar orders Wildstar to range in with the shock cannon.  The two groups of fighters engage each other.  We see a long-distance shot of the flashes of battle through the Argo's radar array (hee hee, a little Macross foreshadowing).  The Star Force fighters clear the area and Wildstar fires the shock cannon. The fighters retreat and the Star Force pilots pursue.

On Pluto, Gantz orders the missiles launched.  The Argo evades the missiles and fires its own missiles to intercept them.  Some of the missiles get through, and Wildstar fires the pulse lasers.  Huh.  The animators thought of everything.  A missile gets through and blasts a hole in the engine room.

Gantz orders the reflex gun readied.  They fire. 

The reflex beam boils out of a lake on Pluto and plunges toward the Argo.  Nova picks it up--just before it strikes the hull.  The engine output starts to run out of control.  The Argo dives toward Pluto.  Avatar orders Wildstar to fire the rocket anchor at Pluto's moon.  It pulls them out of their dive, and Avatar fires the braking jets.  Sandor starts the repairs.  Huh.  The repair montage looks awfully similar to Dairugger . . .

Gantz gloats--even though they're on the far side of Pluto from the base, the reflex gun can fire around corners.  It plots the firing solution.  Hmm.  There are beam-reflector satellites all around the Pluto orbit.  The gun fires again, the beam bouncing from satellite to satellite.  Nova picks it up again--just before it hits them again and blasts them free of the moon to which they're anchored.  Avatar orders them to dive toward the sea on Pluto.  Gantz orders the gun to fire again. 

Partitions close over the corridors and the Argo makes splashdown.  Gantz fires again.  The satellites redirect the beam . . .  And it hits the bridge.  The Argo lists and Venture can't take control.  Avatar is strangely calm as the ship sinks.  Gantz gloats.  The purple dude informs Desslock, who is still caucasian.  And so is his bike-helmet wearing harem.

The Argo continues sinking into Pluto's equatorial sea.  The are only 356 days left.